Dereliction

Major Michael Mori’s “forth­right criticism(link to BBC News site)”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/3418905.stm of the US Mil­i­tary Com­mis­sion that is try­ing his client—the Aus­tralian Guan­tanamo pris­on­er, David Hicks—highlights a fail­ure of the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment to pro­tect its own cit­i­zens. The government’s refusal to demand the release of an Aus­tralian who has com­mit­ted no crime under Aus­tralian law and its acqui­es­cence in a mil­i­tary tri­al that even his mil­i­tary lawyer describes in terms used for ‘kan­ga­roo courts’, weak­ens the rights of all Aus­tralians. Its agree­ment to enforce the out­come of the US tri­al only makes the sit­u­a­tion worse: by agree­ment with the USA, Hicks will serve any prison term in Aus­tralia. The gov­ern­ment believes, accord­ing to its Attor­ney Gen­er­al, that Hicks ‘has a case to answer’ about his asso­ci­a­tion with the Tal­iban. But there is no case: Hicks is inno­cent (not cul­pa­ble) under our laws and deserves the Government’s pro­tec­tion. The only jus­ti­fi­ca­tion that the Attor­ney can “offer(link to tran­script of ABC Radio interview)”:http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2004/s1029591.htm for the government’s neglect of its duty to Hicks is that the law has been sub­se­quent­ly changed in Aus­tralia: as if pros­e­cu­tion by proxy could excuse this Pon­tius Pilate act.

Peter Gallagher

Peter Gallagher is student of piano and photography. He was formerly a senior trade official of the Australian government. For some years after leaving government, he consulted to international organizations, governments and business groups on trade and public policy.

He teaches graduate classes at the University of Adelaide on trade research methods and the role of firms in trade and growth and tweets trade (and other) stuff from @pwgallagher